Everything in Pieces
by Nissho
Summary: With the battle of Ultron won, the Avengers have each gone their separate ways and everything seems to settle down- until Natasha receives a call from Clint that puts the two assassins-turned-agents-turned-superheros back in the field. In over their heads, will they be able to be a team again to find a girl, save the world, and help out an old friend? AU Crossover with AOS Season 3
1. Chapter 1

Natasha glanced at her watch again before crossing her arms and turning her gaze back to the horizon. She counted down silently in her head, "seven, six, five, four…"

Just then a figure appeared in the sky on the horizon line, spreading its wings as it began to descend.

"A little close there, Falcon, you're not getting tired, are you?" Natasha asked, stopping her watch and recording the time on a clipboard as he touched down.

"Aw, come on Romanoff, this was the fifteenth lap."

She looked up from her clipboard to see him on the ground finishing off a second water bottle. "Right, and if you slow down on the next one, you'll have fifteen more to go."

"You're worse than Cap, you know." Sam remarked before rising to his feet and leaping into the air for another lap.

"I know." Natasha spoke aloud and smirked once he was already gone. She knew she was harder on the new recruits than Steve, but it was working out well. She knew they loved to hear constant encouragement from the Captain, but praise from her was something worth working for. And they did work for it. Since starting their training at the new Avengers facility several months back, the team was really beginning to improve, both individually and as a unit.

And Natasha was learning to love her time training them. It was the closest she had ever come to having some sense of normal outside of undercover work. She had the week to train the new Avengers with Steve, Thursdays she would meet with Pepper and Maria for lunch, and some weekends she would drop in on Barton and his family to play Auntie Nat. And while the Avengers were all scattered, they were never too far away. Tony would make trips to the facility to visit and test new equipment with the team. Thor had made the journey from Asgard once or twice, and Banner… She preferred not to think about Banner if she could help it. Life felt normal for Natasha.

"That had to be faster!" Falcon cried out, coming in for a landing once again.

Natasha looked at her watch but didn't bother recording his time. "We'll try again next week." She said plainly, but with a gentle tone, and turned on her heel, heading back inside the building. Sam followed, shaking his head before downing another bottle of water. Once inside, Natasha turned a corner and climbed the steps to the third level meeting room, where she was met with the tired faces of Rhodes, Maximoff, and Vision, and the usual cheery demeanor of Captain America. She took a seat next to Steve. "I take it your training exercise went well?" She inquired, turning to face him.

"We may need to put in a work order for the left half of the parking garage, but they did manage to make it through all of the objectives in time." Steve said with a sly smile. Natasha rolled her eyes as he stood up to address the team.

"So," he started, "I want you all to take this weekend to rest up." That caught the team's attention. "We've been impressed with your improvement so far and Agent Romanoff and I have decided it's time for you all to begin work in the field. Your first assignment briefing will be on Monday at 0500 hours. Don't be late." He dismissed them and they hurried out of the room, starting to discuss weekend plans, and excited at the prospect of going into the field.

"You really think they're ready?" Natasha asked, gazing out after the recruits.

"They've been trained by the best." Steve smiled back at her. Then added, his voice dropping, "and they'll have to be. You know the next threat is just around the corner. And we won't be here to protect the world forever." Natasha sighed and nodded in agreement. She stood to leave and turned back to Cap before crossing the doorway,

"This is how we will be here to protect the world, you know. Make sure there are always Avengers to defend it." Steve nodded in reply and looked down at his hands as she walked out.

Natasha made her way through the complex, passing by the Shield and Stark Industries staff that had made the building their home, until she reached the parking garage that had indeed been halfway destroyed. Luckily her car was still intact, and she carefully made her way out past the wreckage. Once on the road she breathed deeply, taking in the fresh air and open skies before her. She was headed South, but nowhere in particular, just seeking an escape from the hustle of the Avengers Facility.

Her mind started to drift as she cruised down the highway, and she thought about the irony of her current situation. The Black Widow was training up heroes with Captain America, the most righteous man she knew. It still made her feel out of place sometimes, being on a team of superheroes, the good guys. She knew they all came from various backgrounds, but none had as dark a past or as red a ledger as her. She usually pushed those thoughts into a tiny compartment and shut them away before they truly surfaced, but today she let them run free. They took her back years ago to a small figure in a dark alley, weeping.

* * *

_The girl stood there, shivering, wearing barely anything and holding a pair of heels in her hand. But despite her disheveled appearance, when she finally composed herself and began to move, she walked lightly on her feet, with the grace and poise of a ballerina mid dance. The breeze blew gently through her hair, burgundy in the moonlight. Her face was eerily blank, emotionless. Nothing about her would have betrayed the fact that she was leaving behind seven lifeless bodies in the shadows. More than that though, she was leaving behind hundreds of bodies in her past, men, women, and children. She kept glancing behind her as she went, as if expecting something to jump out at any moment. The girl knew someone had been watching her for a few days now, half of this mission, but she hadn't let that distract her from doing her job. Her job was to retrieve the information and eliminate the threat. That was her sole purpose. This was what they had made her._

* * *

Natasha was halfway across the state when her phone rang with the tone reserved strictly for Clint and brought her back to the present. _He's probably asking if I'm coming down this weekend_, she thought to herself. She picked up the phone to answer, "Hey, I'm going to stay at the complex this weekend and get some paperwork done. I'll try to stop by next week, but tell Laura and the kids-"

"Nat." Clint cut in. There were only two or three people alive who would be able to discern the slight edge to his voice as he spoke. "I need you to come to the farm. Now."

"I'll be there in an hour." Natasha replied. They used to joke that she knew him better than his wife, but it was true, she did. And she knew him enough to hear what he said without needing him to put it into words. Clint was in distress, and she needed to be with him now.

As she flew back up the highway, pushing the limits of even the ridiculously expensive sports car Shield had given her, Natasha's mind raced to image what could possibly have Clint so on edge. It wouldn't be the events of a few months ago, their fight with Ultron and Pietro's death. Though she knew those both might have that effect on him, they were things he would work through with Laura. That was one reason she had first grown to trust the woman, Laura Barton was possibly the most empathetic and understanding person Natasha had ever met, and she was always there to help Clint through the nightmares that came from his line of work. But despite that, Laura was a civilian. It would be stupid for Clint to tell her everything. The Avengers Ops were a public matter, the entire world watched the televised incidents. But Shield missions were not always so. Clint knew too well that to tell her everything would be incredibly dangerous if any of his or Shield's enemies ever found out about her. It was better that she not know than risk ever being tortured for information.

So he told Natasha. Besides the fact that they were both level six Shield agents, they had lived practically all their missions together. With a call like this, she thought it may have been about their last Op in Columbia. There was an arms dealer selling modified Asgardian tech there that they had been sent to take out, but during the mission things went South, and there had been child casualties in the village the target was operating out of. It still haunted Natasha's dreams, and with kids of his own, she knew Clint had taken it especially hard.

But still, there were a thousand other gruesome and terrifying things they had witnessed, even in the last year. It was what their skillsets required of them, but it never made the downtime in between easy.

Natasha arrived back at the facility in less than half the time it should have taken and was up in a quinjet in barely twenty minutes. Once in the air, she set the jet to autopilot and texted Clint that she was on her way. She watched the night sky pass by before closing her eyes and mentally preparing herself to be there for her partner.

The quinjet touched down gently in the Bartons' front yard and Natasha wasted no time in getting to the front door, not bothering to knock- she had a key anyway, and letting herself in. "Tasha." Clint said as he heard her come in, standing from where he sat at the kitchen table as she moved to meet him.

"I came as fast as I could." She said, sensing the tension in his voice once again, but this time it was paired with fear in his eyes. She her eyebrows raised in concern, silently asking for an explanation.

In response he simply handed her a piece of paper.

Natasha took the paper and quickly scanned over it. It was a letter, addressed to Clinton F. Barton, mailed to his home address. She squinted in concern. A letter claiming to be from Philip J. Coulson, announcing that he was on his way to Missouri to meet with Clint, that he was in a tough situation and could really use the help of a friend. Stating that he had died and been raised back to life, and that was how he was alive to send this letter. Saying that he knew Clint and Natasha would have questions, and that he would be there in four days to answer all of them. The letter was signed with the signature of the man they had once known as Phil. It was dated from two days ago.

"Laura and the kids." Natasha said as she lowered the letter, finally able to read into what was behind Clint's distress.

"I already evacuated them, they're on their way to safehouse 23." Clint said quickly. "Tasha, only seven people in the world should know this much about me. Whoever this is knows my home, knows about Phil, my life at Shield, knows about my family, about you." There was a real fear in Clint's eyes that Natasha had rarely seen before. This was too personal for him to process alone. "There's no way that someone just found all of this out," he continued, "one of the Avengers, Hill, or Fury had to have alerted someone. They're the only people who know everything."

"You think one of them sold you out to an enemy?" Natasha confirmed as she crossed her arms, knowing the weight of the accusation.

"It's the only explanation, you're the only one I can trust." He replied with a nod.

"So no help from Shield, finding out who this is?"

"I can't, not until I know who betrayed me."

"What's your plan then, Barton?" She asked with understanding.

"Stay with me, please, Nat, I have to be here to see who comes. I have to eliminate the threat." His voice was reminiscent of a child, broken and scared and confused. His family, everything he cared about was under a threat of someone who seemed to know even the most intimate details about him. Natasha understood his need to take that threat down himself. There was no way he could live knowing that someone could come for the ones he loved at any minute. And to top it off, she knew he still felt responsible for Coulson's death. The man had become more than a father to both agents, and Clint had blamed himself for months, feeling that his actions on Loki's behalf had led up to Coulson being murdered in cold blood. To drudge back up those feelings of losing a loved one and threatening to take the lives of the rest of the people he loved was more than he could handle alone.

"I'm here." Natasha replied simply, but it resonated with Clint, and she saw his shoulders visibly relax. She reached out to take his hand and placed the letter on the table. "There's nothing more we can do today, and you need rest." She said, gently but firmly. He let her lead him silently to the guest bedroom that had become Auntie Nat's room for as much as she was at their house. She wondered if the Barton family would ever be able to claim this space again as a home.

She led him to the bed, and he sat on the edge, his body still rigid with stress. She knelt down in front of him and took both of his hands in her own, speaking softly, in a tone few people had ever heard her use. "Look at me Clinton. Your family is safe. I'm safe. I need you to get a shower and change so that we can get some rest and figure this out in the morning." She knew from experience that this type of mental manipulation was tiring, and Clint was prone to worrying, not without good reason.

He took a slow, deep breath before locking eyes with her. "You're right. We have two days; I can afford to sleep." He said almost mechanically and more to himself than to Natasha, as he stood to his feet and headed for the shower. Natasha rose with him and left to grab them clothes to change into, pausing as she passed by Nathaniel's nursery, pushing away a digging feeling that Clint's family, who had become her family, was very much helpless and very much in danger of someone who knew too much and had the confidence to boast it.

She grabbed clothes for Clint and one of his larger shirts for herself. Returning to her room, she put his clothes in the bathroom and waited for him to finish his shower while she texted Steve that she would be off the grid for a few days, but to not hold up training to wait for her. Barton was out quickly, looking a little better off, all things considered. Natasha showered and returned to find him laying peacefully in the guest bed, considerately tucked to one side. His eyes opened as he heard the door close behind her. She wordlessly crawled into the bed beside him, close enough that their backs were touching, grounded. This was the only way they would get any sleep tonight. The way they slept on every mission since Budapest- Clint faced the window, Natasha faced the door, knives under the pillows, guns on the nightstands, go bags under the bed, touching and close enough to feel the presence, or absence, of the other partner. This was how they felt safe when their world was under attack.


	2. Chapter 2

Natasha's eyes snapped opened; her knife in hand and poised to attack as soon as she felt Clint's body leave the bed. "There's a breeze from the mountains this morning." He said calmly in response. Natasha slowly collapsed back onto the bed with a quiet groan upon recognizing the phrase Clint always used to tell her he was awake; no danger was in the room. He used to tell her in plain English but learned the hard way that Natasha's body was on auto-kill mode when she first woke up. They had eventually found the simple phrase to be enough to capture her attention and snap her out of it, and it had stuck ever since.

"Tell the breeze to sleep in a little next time, will you?" She mumbled from her pillow. After a full four hours of rest, the two were feeling much less on edge than the day before. Clint even managed to crack a smile, looking down at his partner. He was reminded that he was the only one who had ever seen her like this. The infamous Black Widow, eyes softly closed, hair pulled into a crimson messy bun, a small smile on her lips, relaxed. He took his time standing up to stretch and made his way toward the door.

"I'll be in the kitchen whenever you decide to drag your butt out of bed, sunshine." He said lightly.

Natasha groaned and rolled over in reply but sat up as soon as the door closed. There was no way she could physically keep sleeping with Clint gone and the sunlight in her face, so she got up and started to get ready for the day, whatever it would bring.

She met Clint in the kitchen, and he handed her a steaming cup of coffee as she sat at the table with him. He knew better than to expect a "thank you" from her before 0600. Outside the sun was barely starting to rise, but Natasha could tell he was already restless. She silently observed him absent-mindedly running his hand through his hair. It would be a long two days of waiting for whoever was coming, and there wasn't much they could do to prepare without alerting Shield and risk tipping off whoever was behind this.

It was unusual for her to be in this position. Usually he was the one coaxing her to be patient. Natasha knew it was engrained in him from the time he first picked up a bow and learned to wait for the perfect shot. Of course, he was shooting at targets then. Later in life, the army had him waiting even longer, sometimes in the same position for days while the practiced sniper waited for someone to call in the shot. But his biggest test of patience, by far, was the Black Widow. She remembered when he first brought her to Shield, she had refused to say a word for weeks. It had taken months before she was willing to trust him enough to even begin to open up to him. The whole time the Hawk had never lost his temper and never lost hope, waiting for her to come around. And he had kept that unwavering patience ever since.

So it unnerved her to see him so agitated. "Hey," she finally spoke gently, and he looked up from his coffee to meet her eyes, "it's been a while since we've trained together." She knew, though her words were true, what they implied was not. It would take years apart to undo the ease with which the two assassins fought together. Still, training took concentration, and while they were concentrated on training, there was little room to stress about the coming days.

Clint kept a straight face, his voice barely betraying his playful tone, "If you're volunteering to retrieve arrows after target practice, you know I'm always up for it."

"Whatever." Natasha replied smiling, as she finished off her coffee and walked over to the counter to pour another cup.

"Tasha," Clint asked, as he turned to look out the window.

"Hmm?" Natasha responded, now browsing the kitchen for breakfast.

"Something's been bothering me about the letter."

"Everything?" She asked, settling on some fresh fruit and a bagel.

"No, there's something else. I can't put my finger on it, but it feels like it's really from him." Clint paused, shaking his head as Natasha sat back down across from him, sliding him a plate with a bagel. "It sounds like his voice, like it's his writing." He picked up the bagel and broke off a piece. "I didn't even consider that it could be true but…" He trailed off as his eyes drifted back to the window and he reluctantly took a bite of his breakfast.

"Barton, you've got to stop. You're letting this get inside your head. You can't go down that path, I know how many times you watched the security footage of that day. Phil Coulson is dead."

Her words hung in the air for a dark moment before Clint replied carefully, "I would have said the same thing a few years ago, but after everything we've seen- Tasha, I saw Artificial Intelligence brought to life, countless people with magical powers, you can't seriously think anything is impossible anymore."

"Clint, listen to me," Nat said, an edge creeping into her voice as she forced his distant gaze to meet her eyes. She knew this hope he was trying to give himself was going to kill him when it fell through. It was far better to rip the band-aid off now. "Phil Coulson is dead, and we have to believe that's the truth, because otherwise he would have called. He would have contacted us. We would have heard something, literally anything, but we haven't because he's gone. It's a hard truth, but it's the only truth we can trust."

Clint leaned back in his chair, defeated. "I know." They both finished the meal in silence. Clint was lost in thought, remembering the man who had made him.

_A much younger Clint Barton counted his breaths as he looked down the scope of his rifle. By the third, his body was completely relaxed and still. On the seventh, his finger reached for the trigger. At the tenth exhale, a gentle squeeze. On the twelfth he stood from his prone position on the rooftop to pack his things. The job was done and there was no reason to stay any longer than he needed to. Though Rio was a beautiful location, the sentiment was lost on Clint. It was hot and sticky, and with all his equipment, the humidity had been a pain. Just as he was about to leave a movement from the window he had just been aiming for caught his eye. He grabbed his binoculars, wiping the condensation from the lenses. He preferred not to witness the aftermath of a kill, but it was critical for this kill that he had not been seen and compromised. A small girl appeared in Clint's view next to the mark, who was now lifeless on the floor. She knelt down, her hair blowing in the wind that was coming in through the window shattered by the bullet. Clint should have left. He hadn't been seen. His mission wasn't compromised. But still he watched. _

_This wasn't the first time he had witnessed the effects of death, or even death that he had caused, but something was different here. The little girl stood and walked to the window, raising a hand to the shattered glass. She shouldn't have seen him from that distance, but as she looked through the window, he met her gaze and felt the fear in her eyes gripping his soul. He had made orphans out of children before, but he had been able to keep that at a distance. Dissociate, dissociate, dissociate, until his job was nothing more than breathing and pulling a trigger. He might know that a mark had children and no other family to speak of, but he made sure to keep those thoughts at a distance, never allow his mind to wander beyond a shot. But her fearful stare had his mind racing, imagining a life without parents, a life he knew too well. Imagining the little girl waking up from a nightmare in the middle of the night and having no father to come to the rescue. Imagining life in orphanages and foster homes, a life on the streets. Imagining a future of hatred and confusion that is sure to lead to violence._

_Suddenly she pointed. Straight at Clint. Then turned, screaming to someone._

_"No, no, no, no, no…" Clint stashed his binocular, moving fast, and dropped back to his stomach on the rooftop. He aimed his rifle at the window once again, catching the girl in his sight and taking a deep breath. His finger reached for the trigger. He took one breath. Then another. Then a third before taking the shot. The bullet collided with wall, missing the little girl by inches. The sniper stood and worked quickly to pack his things and leave before he was found._

_At the unmistakable sound of a pistol cocking behind him, Clint whipped around, grabbing and aiming his Glock with trained speed and precision. He came face to face with a man in a suit and sunglasses, aiming his pistol at Clint's head. "Marcia." He said calmly, expressionlessly. _

_Clint said nothing, but the man had his attention._

_He elaborated. "Marcia is her name. The little girl down there. The one you just let live."_

_"Who are you?" Clint growled, feeling vulnerable at being caught so off guard._

_"She's seven years old. About the age you were when you lost your father, right Clinton?" When Clint said nothing, he continued. "In the fire that burned your house down just days after your mother passed, right, and you and your brother -"_

_Clint lunged at the man, having heard enough. He forced the man's weapon aside and attempted to push him to the ground. Just as he made contact, however, he winced at a piercing pain in his neck and took a step back before lifting his weapon again. The other man dropped a syringe to the ground and made no attempt to fight back or defend himself. _

_"I know who you are, Barton. An archer for the circus, a sniper in the army with a dishonorable discharge, now you're what? A contract assassin? Do you even know why the Vermelho wanted you to kill this girl's father? This man had information on an arms deal between them and a terrorist organization that's killed thousands of children in Egypt in the past month. Do you care, or are you that desperate for purpose? I think you're better than this Clint. I believe that you are better than this. That's why you let her go." He paused, taking off his sunglasses, and tucking them away, not acknowledging the weapon aimed at him, nor the pained face of the man behind it._

_Clint's head was spinning as he struggled to comprehend what the man had said- this man who shouldn't even know his name. It became more and more difficult as whatever he was injected with took hold and he felt himself losing consciousness. The other man stepped in to catch him when he stumbled forward, almost hitting the concrete. His gun dropped to the ground as he slumped uncontrollably into the stranger's arms. He vaguely heard an irritated female voice coming over the man's comm._

_"Coulson! You had strict orders to eliminate this threat on site. Straight from the Director!" _

_Clint heard the man speak calmly, now fully supporting Clint's weight. "I know what Fury ordered, Hill." He gently lowered Clint to the ground, laying him on his back and leaving a hand on the archer's shoulder. Clint struggled to stay conscious as the man, Coulson, spoke again, locking eyes with Clint. "I made a different call."_

* * *

Clint breathed deeply, unfazed by Natasha's handgun firing down the range beside him. He took another breath, knocking an arrow.

"You don't think this could be Fury right?" Clint asked, taking another breath before firing.

"Fury?" Natasha asked, pausing to reload her weapon. "No, he can be a pain with classified info, but this doesn't feel like his style."

"What about Julie Cameron?" Clint knocked another arrow.

"That stalker? Not the malicious type." She switched the gun to her other hand.

"Alexikoff?" He fired.

"Doesn't have the brains for this op." She fired.

"Oscar Nandirez?" He took a breath.

"The Chitauri weapons guy?" Natasha responded between shots.

"Yeah remember, uh, I think he used some kind of psychological torment his hostages." Clint fired again.

"Clint, he died last year in prison." She sighed before continuing to fire.

"Oh." The archer breathed out, shallow this time.

Clint fired three arrows down the range in quick succession.

The steady rhythm of shots beside him stopped as Natasha lowered her weapon and looked up at Clint, her eyebrows furrowed. All three shots had missed.

She spoke softly, but her voice betrayed a deeper concern. "Barton, you've been compromised."

He said nothing, distraughtly firing three more arrows down the range. Then, becoming more reckless, another three and another. None pierced the target.

"Clint, stop."

He fired another arrow, shouting in frustration.

"Clinton."

He frantically reached for another arrow, but Natasha grabbed his wrist tightly. The contact was enough for Natasha to get his full attention for a moment. "Clint, you need to stop."

"Nat, I can't- I- It's like Loki all over again I feel like someone's inside my head, I just need to know who, Nat, you know I can't- I don't think I can do this again."

Natasha let go of his wrist as he put down his bow and closed his eyes, running a hand through his hair.

"This is not like Loki all over again," Natasha calmly replied, "You're not alone this time, we're going to face this together." She reached out and gently touched his shoulder.

"And we're going to face it now…" She added, casting a wary look as she caught sight of an unfamiliar quinjet on the horizon, quickly approaching. The two armed themselves, on high alert. Any trace of distress faded from Clint's body as he focused all his concentration on the incoming jet.

* * *

The quinjet's bay door opened as Clint and Natasha cautiously approached, each taking aim at the figure appearing in the entrance. Natasha marked only one figure with hands raised in a gesture of surrender. It was still hard to make them out from the distance and the shadow of the bay door, but the figure's manner was eerily familiar to the two agents. It was familiar in a way that broke Barton and set Natasha on edge.

"Tasha-" Clint's voice trembled.

"No." Natasha breathed back to him.

The way that he moved, obviously masculine, the way he walked, deliberate in each step. As they got closer, his appearance, a clean suit, half-smile, sunglasses, the way he tilted his head. Down to the pattern of his breath, this man was undeniably Phil Coulson.

Natasha fired two shots. Coulson crumpled to the deck.


End file.
